Share via

The era of the lager lout may not be quite dead, but a growing thirst for beers with flavour and provenance has sparked the first increase in real ale volumes for 20 years.

According to the annual Cask Report, published today, pub-goers quaffed about 2.2 million barrels — equivalent to about 633 million pints — of cask ale last year, up 1.6 per cent on 2010.

During the same period, cask also overtook keg, where the beer is filtered, pasteurised and artificially carbonated, as the most popular form of draught ale and lifted its penetration of the pub market to 56 per